


Aftercare

by TheEvangelion



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Aftercare, BDSM, Bottom Kara Danvers, Bruises, Caretaking, Comfort, Daddy Kink, Daddy Lena, Dom Lena Luthor, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Lesbian Lena Luthor, Non-Sexual Submission, Physical Abuse, Protective Lena Luthor, Sub Kara Danvers, Top Lena Luthor, True Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-05
Updated: 2018-10-05
Packaged: 2019-07-25 18:55:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16203620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheEvangelion/pseuds/TheEvangelion
Summary: Kara and Lena are unlikely roommates and good friends who happen to both be into the BDSM scene. It comes in handy when Kara finds herself limping home after a scene gone terribly wrong in reluctant need for someone to take care of her. [Warning: this may be triggering for some people, physical injuries that need tending to and heavy dealings of issues with consent.]





	Aftercare

**Author's Note:**

> _Ludovico Einaudi - Night_

There’s an itch beneath your skin that no amount of scratching seems to soothe. 

An overwhelming sense that something is out of place, and, yet, you cannot seem to recall what it is. It’s not an oven that’s been left on or locked door that wasn’t doubled checked, you’re quite certain of that. There are no pets at home that you have forgot to feed, well, other than your roommate, Lena, who is thankfully in possession of enough opposable thumbs to muster up her own dinner. It dawned on you as the subway cart pulled back into your station that the thing that was out of place—not quite left the way it was supposed to be—is you. 

The scene had gone as planned in its execution, no argument there. The hard limits and no-gos had been outlined and clarified and then re-clarified some more for the last few days over the app before the date even got underway. You had been looking forward to the date, actually. It’s rare you get to indulge in your rawest and kinkiest desires, to have a woman who knows what she’s doing degrade you with pretty acid-tongued words, to feel the ferocity of her lovemaking ache into your skin for days afterwards. Leslie certainly ticked all of those boxes from the offset. 

It was all going so well right up until the pale hands around your throat got just a little too tight, a little too unrelenting. You should have tapped, should have said red, should have shifted the pace right there and then, but, you didn’t. And that’s the trouble with being submissive, you suppose. When you’re stuck in that dreamy deep level of readiness to do whatever it takes to make your partner happy - sometimes your own wants and needs take a back seat. Sometimes, like tonight, you clamber in the back and join them there, becoming all but a silent onlooker peering in on the scene until the games are happening _to_ you instead of _with_ you.

You catch a glimpse of yourself in the steel reflection of the escalator travelling up towards the surface of the blustering street. The marks around your throat are pink and shaped like fingers. They will be bruising and purpling by tomorrow, you’re all too aware. It has you nudging your chin forward into the lip of your scarf, embarrassed and bristling into the thought of the turtle necks you’ll have to dig out from the lost layers of your closet and drawers.

“Kara!” You hear your name called from further down the escalator. 

Two footsteps race up behind you and before you turn around to see who it is, a hand softly grabs the back of your arm. It makes you flinch and you don’t know why.

“Woah.” Lena pulls her hand away immediately. “Sorry! Didn’t mean to make you jump. I ran out to get food but I didn’t think you would be coming back so early, I think we can share but if you want I’ll head back and get you something?” She smiles and lifts those carefully manicured brows in your direction apologetically.

“Oh god no!" You become hurried and desperate to reassure. You glance down at your shoes with an embarrassed shake of your head. “I’m sorry, you shouldn’t have to do that. I, er, I should have called and let you know I was coming back.” It dawns on you from the curious look in her eyes that you’re already coming across flustered and flung out of space.

“Why are you apologising? I offered? Also you never have to call, Kara, I’m not your mom.” The corners of her crimson lips turn upwards with a soft laugh that grates your ears as if she is mocking you.

“Right,” you laugh awkwardly. “I’m sorry I didn’t…” You begin to apologise again but you’re sent tumbling to your knees by the end of the escalator, the ground hits you so hard and fast you’re left blinking and embarrassed, scrambling to clamber back up on to your feet while the long line of people behind you try their best to step around the lump on the floor, tutting and rolling their eyes as they pass.

“Hey are you okay?” Lena bent down and helped you up.

“Yeah, sorry.” You shake your head and pull your purse back over your shoulder. “You know how it is after a scene, takes a little while to come back to planet earth." You brush it off and move forwards out of the way.

Lena is silent as she walks beside you. It strikes you as funny. Lena is rarely quiet and often forthright, always eager to tease you when you’re flustered and caught in a flap, which is more often than you like to admit. You glance and catch sight of her light green eyes narrowed in your direction, her tongue pushed up against the corner of her bottom teeth. It’s the look of a dominant. A protective, unhappy, truly displeased dominant. 

You’ve seen her look at other women that way before, usually when you’ve came home early from work unannounced and accidentally caught her in the act. Though this is the first time you can remember her ever looking at you like this. It has you stuck and vulnerably submissive, nervous and anxious because those are feelings never appropriate for crowded public places on a Friday evening.

“Is everything okay? You seem stuck on something?” You ask softly, unable to meet her acute stare.

“Why don’t you tell me?” She never misses a beat.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” You try to brush it off again with a small laugh, as if she is the one completely spun out right now. You shake your head and reach inside your bag for the keys to the apartment.

Her hand gently halts you.

You look up and Lena is staring down the end of her nose right at you, her jaw working itself into an early grave. Her manicured nails pull away from your wrist and lightly slip around the edge of your scarf so she can get a better look at whatever it is that has got her so tightly wound and upset. She takes one glance and looks away, blinking and biting her lips.

“You don’t like breath play or choking, you mentioned that once,” she says.

“Lena, I’m fine, honestly, can you cool it?” You snap and absolutely refuse to entertain the idea that your roommate knows more about your sexual proclivities than the dominant who was inside of you less than an hour ago.

The journey from the front door to the building to the top floor apartment is spent with her eyes buried into you, weighing you up, trying to figure you out. She tried to speak on the third floor but the words refused her and so she sighed instead and remained purposefully silent, almost as if she were trying to scold you with the act. The apartment is warm when you finally walk inside, it smells of her perfume and clean laundry from the open dryer that is waiting to be folded and put away where it belongs. You can’t help but empathise. The door closes behind you and you flinch again as if you were caught in a daydream.

“I’m going to heat the food up, there’s enough to share?” She offers tentatively with a soft glance.

“That would be great. I’m going to shower.” You nod towards the open bathroom door and make your quick escape before she can reply.

Once the bathroom door is locked you breathe a sigh of relief and rub your forehead. It’s then the complaints of your body begin. You hunch forward and feel the tight heat of your sore bruised spine awaken into a stinging pain that makes you jerk upright. The throttled bruising of your throat starts to stir into a persistent dull ache. The soreness of your palms where you clung to the rope for dear life surface into tiny white blisters. You don’t dare to look at your reflection in the mirror, scared of the woman who might peer back at you. Instead you run the shower and click your neck.

Nothing a hot shower can’t fix, you promise yourself.

You remained under the water until your fingers start to wrinkle. It’s the smell of food and sound of plates that stirs you back to reality, suddenly aware that you had spaced out and the water is now growing cool.

You step out of the shower and catch a glimpse of yourself in the mirror as you dry off. It makes the breath catch in your throat. The welts on your spine are raised and angry, they form long red lines that criss cross your back where the blood has been drawn to the surface. On your ass, over the plumpness of your flesh, the bruises are already purpling and furious. You look like you’ve been hit by a bus. The urge to cry comes thick and fast, it has your breath stilting, your chest pushing and pulling, your eyes widen and refuse to blink. You don’t allow yourself the satiation of giving into it. You push the tears and the panic down into the deepest parts of your belly. You didn’t safeword. You didn’t say no. You didn’t tell her to slow down. You allowed this to happen to you. You _wanted_  this to happen to you. The thoughts become frantic and too quick to hold on to for more than a second at a time.

A knock to the bathroom door damn near frightens the life out of you.

“Kara?” Lena calls your name. You relax slightly. “The food is still hot but it won’t be for long, should I put it back in the oven?”

“No, no, I’m coming,” your voice trumpets and staccatos out.

You wrap the towel around you and make your exit, dragging yourself towards your half-cracked open bedroom door. You pause and punish yourself some more, you have no salve or ointment in your drawer and there is definitely none in the medicine cabinet. You turn back and peek your head around the corner where Lena has planted herself in the kitchen, shirt rolled up to her forearms and hands dug deep into the dishes in the sink. You don’t know why, but it’s a reassuring sight that makes you feel slightly more centred.

“Hey Leen,” you speak up quietly. “You don’t have some salve rolling around anywhere, do you?”

She stops what she’s doing and hums an affirmative noise. “That bad?” she asks with a measured tone and doesn’t look at you.

“A little,” you whisper.

“God Kara.” You watch her shake her head and pull her hands out of the water. She reaches for the dish towel and finally looks at you, her expression now suddenly blank and taken aback. “Fucking christ, what happened to you?” Her voice becomes worried.

“Lena, nothing happened. I checked out a little bit, that’s all, I promise,” you reassure hurriedly.

It’s too late, she’s walking over to you, that determined expression and push of tongue into the corner of her teeth consuming her entire existence. There is a softness to her still, that protective glower that makes you feel woefully small and injured.

“I am worried and I really do not like being worried. I have seen you come home from scenes before and you _never_ look like this, you never have bruises on you because that is not the kind of play you're into and if I know that then the dominant who takes control of you during play should damn well better know it too. Did she hurt you? In ways you didn’t ask for, I mean?” Her brows do the thing.

“I didn’t safeword if that is what you’re asking." You peer down at your feet.

“That isn’t what I’m asking, Kara. I’m asking you if she made sure you were okay? I’m asking if she checked in and asked if it was okay to wring your neck like that? I’m asking if...holy shit.” Lena stopped suddenly and catches sight of something. “Kara... did she whip your back?” Her voice breaks into utter concern.

You inhale and the words won’t roll off your tongue. You can’t even deny it. All you can do is stand there like a lame duck, like a rabbit caught in headlights, like a wounded deer backed into a corner. This isn’t as big a deal as she’s making out, you bristle internally, willing yourself to believe it.

“Did she whip your back?” Lena repeated.

“It was my fault." You start and stop. “I told her I liked impact stuff and when she asked if she could use her new whip I just sort of went with it and didn’t set any limits. It’s on me. I was drifting in and out and I didn’t know how to say no,” you explain it away nervously and tighten the towel around your damp body.

“Oh god." Lena clenches her eyes closed and her nostrils flare and tighten. She opened her eyes again, "Please tell me she took care of you, honey?” Lena asks quietly and stares into your entire soul.

There’s something about that one little word that has you tripping over yourself internally again, that has you inhaling and blinking and trying not to be so woefully stuck in that deepest layer of subspace anymore. You can’t explain yourself and that is by far the worst part. You can’t say, ‘I feel vulnerable right now and I don’t know how to extrapolate that into something that makes sense.’ All you can do is feel your lips tremble and your chest wring and ache with the need to be held and reassured that you are, in fact, a good girl and you haven’t done anything wrong.

“I just put my clothes on and left while she was in the bathroom,” you mumble and dry a pathetic tear. “She would have took care of me if I asked her to but I just wanted to be somewhere familiar. Can you please go and get the damn salve now so I can eat and go to sleep?”

“Look at me,” Lena tells you with the low and reassuring rasp of authority. “You’re spinning out and I need you to know everything is okay, nobody is mad with you, you haven’t done anything wrong, you’re safe and you’re here with me, okay? I will go and get you whatever you need but I want you to look me in the eyes and honest to god tell me that you are alright.”

You hear the sound of someone sobbing, and it takes you an uncomfortable number of seconds to realise that it is you. Through bleary wet eyes you watch the woman in front of you, your friend, your stupid, clever, unfathomably untouchable best friend, unravel herself into the safe shape of a dominant that just wants to take care of you.

“Oh baby,” Lena says it so quietly and confident as if she is so familiar with calling you that word it’s practically second nature. You’re suddenly trapped in her warm safe arms, a little thing burrowing beneath her long jawline, a set of arms that are clinging around her shoulders as if they’re cliff edges you’re hanging off. 

“What has she done to my pretty girl?” She whispers it into your hair.

“I don’t know but I feel stuck in subspace and it's making me feel really delicate,” you almost whimper as your hand slips up to touch your throat.

“Can Daddy take care of you for a while tonight? Is there someone else you want me to call? What does my pretty girl need?” She croons softly.

Fuck, she hits you with that word and you are so woefully lost in stormy seas. You know Lena likes to be called Mistress, it’s written all over her Fet Life profile. She’s teased you more than once about the fact you like calling your dominants Daddy, that it just feels warmer than anything else, that it somehow makes you feel safer. You untuck your head and peer up at her, suddenly aware there’s nobody else’s arms you would rather be nestled in to right now.

“I just want to be here, with you for a little while, please,” you say dumbly and wipe your wet cheeks.

“Okay, I can do that.” She gently squeezes your wrists, “Can you show me your back, please? I need to know what to use to make it hurt less.”

The saliva suddenly becomes an entire ocean beneath your tongue. You look down at your feet and rub your elbow, unsure of what to do with yourself. You want to say yes. You want to unravel yourself and let her put you back together again. You just don’t know quite how to allow yourself to do those things. Instead, you fumble and burn bright red with embarrassment.

“Look at me.” She lifts your jaw beneath the pads of her fingers with a sigh. “I want you to repeat after me, ‘I am a good girl, and I haven’t done anything wrong.’”

“That’s not true though, I should have safeworded. I should have said something—”

“I am a good girl, and I haven’t done anything wrong,” she repeats herself with a stare deep enough to cut through your aching body right to the bone.

“I’m a good girl,” you mumble and sigh, “and I haven’t done anything wrong.”

“Tell me again,” Lena whispers.

“I’m a good girl and I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Tell me again.”

“I’m a good girl,” you nod, affirmed by the repetition. “And I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“Turn around for Daddy,” she hums and guides you with sturdy hands wrapped in to your hips.

The next thing you know you’re facing your bedroom door. The towel has slipped forward and is barely covering your breasts. You clench your eyes closed and listen to the sound of her breaths, the way she inhales and holds on to them just a little too long. The feeling of fragility comes once again, but, this time isn’t half as terrifying. You feel fingertips slip along the dip of your shoulder blade and hear the tut of a worried Lena examining you closer. You lean forward and clench the towel, allowing her ministrations to slip down the ridges of your spine.

“What the hell did she do to my pretty girl,” Lena growls. “I’m in half a mind to go over there—”

“Please be soft,” you interrupt her and swallow the anxiety creeping up your windpipe at the thought of Lena being anywhere else other than right here, taking care of you. “I… I don’t think I can handle you at one-hundred right now, can you bring it down to sixty? Please?”

There is a loud inhale, then, finally, she speaks. “Okay. Thank you for telling me what you need. You’re making me feel very useful,” she answers sincerely. You don’t know what to do with that information.

“Does my back look bad?”

“Horrific. But, thankfully, you’re still very beautiful,” she answers immediately, her hands find the corners of the towel and they are carefully wrapped around your spine again. “Go and get in Daddy’s bed for now and get cosy. I’ll bring you food and then we can fix you up and get your room comfortable.” Lena kisses the top of your head.

You blush pink with embarrassment, unable to move as she turns back towards the kitchen and gathers the things she needs, opening cupboards and drumming her fingers against the doors, utterly in control and ordered in her ministrations as the plates are stacked and the cutlery grabbed. It makes you feel so safe. It makes you feel so stupidly safe and yet somewhere beneath your utter need to just exist right now at the mercy of a gentle god you can’t help but admonish yourself. Here you are, a trembling little broken toy unsure of what to do with yourself, and she is having to put you back together again—

“Kara,” she speaks up sternly and interrupts you with a single glance. “You’re floating away. Are you with me right now?”

“I’m with you.” You swallow and nod.

“What did I ask you to do, baby?”

“To go and get in bed and relax,” you repeat with a quiet sigh.

“Is that something you want to do?”

“I think so.”

“Then move it, cutie. I’ll be there in a sec.”

“Yes ma’am,” you reply. 

There is a quick flutter of her eyes, a brightness that devours them whole, even. It’s as if something just awoken inside of her on that singular word, something that was asleep and beginning to stir but is now irrevocably alive and aware and bubbling inside of her. She looks at you with a purse of her crimson lips, a deep inhale that has her bottom ribs lunging outwards. You pause for a moment, waiting for her to speak but the words do not come. Instead you are met with her wide-eyed silence. And so, disappointedly, with a slump of your shoulders, you nudge towards her bedroom door and let yourself inside. 

Her bedroom is clean and modest, and somehow, all the more elegant because of that. You’ve been in here more than a few times, sure, but for some unplaceable reason you’re seeing it through new eyes. The light grey walls and hung abstract paintings are calming on your soul. Her bed shows the signs of wear and movement, the pillows left with the impression of where she was no doubt laying before she left earlier this evening. The prospect of being a small thing curled up in that safe spot makes you breathe a little easier.

You clamber over the mattress with a wince, your back stinging and reminding you of where you’ve been tonight. You make yourself as small as you can on her side of the bed, tucked into the impression she left in the hopes you might fall into the ghosts of where her body has been and quietly make sense of yourself in the safety you find there. It smells faintly of her perfume. It smells exotic and light. You inhale deeply and allow yourself to just… _be._

Leslie isn’t a bad person, you tell yourself that with a conflicted sigh. Then again, you don’t really know Leslie at all, do you? On the other hand, you do know Lena. You know the way she tucks her pen behind her ear and furrows her brows when she’s deep in thought. The way she always has change in her pocket, and the way that change tends to find itself into outstretched palms in the street and parking meters that are nearly up. You know that her most shameful secret is that she underlines sentences she likes in library books so that the next person who crosses that page takes a closer look and feels the words in their bones the way she does. Lena Luthor, vandal of public property, the thought makes you breathe a sound that closely resembles a faint laugh.

“You don’t look out of place, sweetheart.”

You peer over the ball of your shoulder at the juggler stood at the door, plates and accoutrements balanced precariously in her arms. Lena smiles and is somehow, strangely, no longer Lena at all. The woman in front of you is taller and her stare is more acute and powerful. There’s nothing frightening about her though. The fact seems strange. There is an implicit sense of trust that befuddles you and it’s unexpected to say the least, fragile and vulnerable as you are feeling. Lena just stands there, lofty and staunch and achingly safe, waiting for some sign that it's okay to approach you, and you are left gulping at the sight of her.

“You’re not speaking, Kara.” She lifts a manicured brow. “Do you want me to go back to just being plain old—”

“Can you be my safe thing tonight?” you ask quietly with a burst of bravery, embarrassed and blushing already by the request. “I feel safe here with you when you look at me like that and talk the way you're talking right now and… I don’t want that feeling to go away, not until tomorrow. Can you please let me just be in my head and make me feel safe?”

Lena inhales and holds her breath, glancing you up and down as if she is weighing you up. “Are you mentally in a place where you can colour code for me? Red for stop completely, yellow for slow down?”

“Lena… I don’t want to play tonight…” You suddenly become terrified that you might have just given her the wrong idea.

“No, honey, oh god no I don’t mean that. You’re obviously feeling delicate and I just… I need to know that if you’re asking me to take control of a power dynamic—even if it’s just emotionally—I need to know that you’re in a place where you can tell me to back off if it gets too intense or stops being what you want?”

There she goes being so woefully perfect again, the realisation smashes into you and makes you weaker. 

“I can do that.” You nod.

“Good girl,” Lena praises you with a soft smile. “Can you do something for Daddy tonight?”

That one word has your breathing harder, falling deeper, slipping through the layers of yourself in the most cathartic way possible. You nod without a second thought.

“Use your voice. Use all your words. Don’t second guess yourself or think I’ll toy with you for saying the wrong thing or the wrong pronoun. I want you to try your hardest to speak when being spoken to, sweetie, because nothing can be misconstrued then.” She sits down next to you on the bed and leans herself into the pillows against the headboard.

“Yes ma’am, I can do all of that,” you whisper.

You watch her blink rapidly, as if that word is having a similar kind of effect on her sensibilities too. 

“Good,” she clears her throat and peers down at you. “Can you please roll on your belly so I can put some antiseptic cream and Arnica on your back?”

“Will it hurt?” You feel yourself grow smaller.

“I’ll be very, very gentle,” she reassures with a quirk that pulls the corner of her mouth.

“Can you give me lots of praise?”

“Keep being such a good girl for me and you won’t have to ask.” She lifts her brow again. You gulp and feel something throb inside of you.

“You’re really good at putting me right back in subspace,” you admit shakily.

“Let yourself go there for me if that's where you want to be, I’ll keep you safe.”

You roll on to your belly and nuzzle your cheek into the goose feather pillow. The towel around your back is gently peeled away at the corners and drawn down to the small of your spine, leaving goosebumps awakening all over your skin. Lena breathes harder, holding on to each one of her breaths slightly longer than the last. 

“Start from the beginning. Tell me everything that happened and lets see if we can piece our way back to here and now, alright?” Lena encourages.

You feel her nails trail delicately down your back, as if she is gauging the severity of your bruises, the ones on the outside and the ones hiding behind your bones too. It makes you wince and push forward away from her. You hope, instantaneously, that she will follow.

“Okay honey, it’s alright,” she hums and does exactly that, her fingers making gentle work of rubbing something cool on a sore spot adjacent to your shoulder. “You’re safe, everything is okay.” You hear yourself sigh in relief at the comforting tone.

“We got beers at the bar and played pinball and just kinda talked for a while. She let me win every round. I thought that was nice…” You become stuck, suddenly aware of yourself in the worst way possible. Are you making all of this worse than what it really is? Leslie let you win at pinball and insisted on paying the bar tab. Bad people don’t do that. You inhale and blink rapidly, wondering whether you should get up, call her, and apologise for hauling ass out of there while she was in the shower.

“Settle,” Lena tells you sternly. “I’ve seen that look before, it’s the one you do when you’re feeling guilty about something.”

“How can I not feel guilty? I ran out on her and now you’ve had to give up your night just to take care of me… it’s enough to make a girl feel a little guilty.”

“Well don’t.” Lena never misses a beat, her palm smoothing something that makes you burn and cool simultaneously down your back. “I like taking care of girls. I like taking care of you. I like fixing things. I think that’s kinda what separates a dominant and a sadist, Kara. There’s a level of care and nurture that goes into domination. There’s a confidence you have to have too, a sort of… panache? Until you know you can read a submissive woman’s mind and elevate her to the levels of play she wants to explore and steer away from the ones she doesn’t… well, you’re not a dominant. You’re just a person playing dress up.”

Her words make you hold your breath. You realise a little too late that those words are everything you've ever wanted to hear.

“What happened after pinball, pretty girl?” She asks and absentmindedly pushes your hair forward off your neck to rub a knot you never even knew you had.

“We went back to hers, she told me to kneel and pick out some toys off the coffee table that I liked the look of,” you mumble into the pillow.

“What did you pick?”

“Daddy…” You blush crimson.

“Don’t answer if you don’t feel comfortable, just give me an idea of what it was you were looking for when you went back to her place.”

“No, no it’s fine.” You inhale and can’t help but imagine what it would have been like having Lena wielding the toys you picked out instead of Leslie. “I chose a steel butt plug and a wooden paddle. I told her the strap on was a maybe but I’d have to let her know later. She was happy enough with that.”

“I should imagine she was,” Lena bristles, wringing and placing a warm damp cloth on the side of your hip. “You’ve got a little cut, it might sting but I’ll be gentle.”

“It’s alright,” you reassure and hold back the urge to grit your teeth. How could a nick that small sting so bad? You’re not sure you want to find out again. Ever.

“When did you start noticing things were getting out of hand?” Lena asks.

“Maybe an hour into the session? She had made this game of paddling me for ten consecutive strikes, and if I could make it to the tenth then I would get a reward, but if I made a mistake she would go back to the first one and begin again harder than last time with her hand around my throat. No matter what I did she wouldn’t let me get to the tenth one. She gave up in the end and told me I wasn’t good enough to win the game.”

You feel Lena’s entire existence pause. It starts in her hands, they withdraw from your skin and you miss them instantaneously. Her breathing halts for a moment. You find yourself waiting, wondering, hoping, for that next deep gulp of air so that you know she is still there. After a moment she rewards you with a swallow, then a small cough to clear her throat.

“Do you mind if I look a little lower south to the small of your back?”

Her tacidness and reservation makes you feel more fragile.

“You can look at my butt,” you affirm, trying to seem alright.

The towel is pulled away from your ass and you watch Lena take one glance and then flinch away instantly as if the sight repulsed her.

“How many times did she hit you with the paddle, Kara?” Lena’s voice becomes morose. You watch her blink a few times, swallowing.

“I don’t know.”

“Ballpark figure?”

“Maybe eighty times? I kind of zoned out. It hurt more than any time I’ve been paddled before so I just kinda… dazed out and went to a place where it wasn’t so painful?”

“Kara have you ever been hit with a wooden paddle before?”

“No Daddy,” you admit, admonishing yourself for having to reveal your inexperience. Would Lena make fun of you for being such a novice? Would the teasing about it come tomorrow morning? You could barely stomach the thought. “It’s not as if she had a leather one though and it was painted pastel pink so I just… I didn’t think it would be bad.”

“This,” Lena said, drawing her hand in the air over your body as if she were circling an answer, “Is tantamount to assault, Kara. These are the kind of bruises I would expect to see on someone who is really, really, _really_ into pain play and has asked to be hit that hard.” She pinches the bridge of her nose.

“I didn’t…I didn’t safeword, I didn’t say red. It’s not as if she could have known.”

For some reason, your words pique Lena’s ears and have her peering at you with this intense morosity that makes your heart stop.

“You didn’t say red?” Lena reconfirms softly.

“Are you mad with me?”

“No! Oh god, honey, no, I’m not mad,” the words rush out of her mouth and her hands are suddenly cupping your cheeks, wiping away tears you didn’t realise had bloomed. “I just need to know, did you say yellow at any point? Did you tell her to slow down and she didn’t listen?”

“I…” You become stuck and bite the bottom of your lip. “I didn’t do that. That didn’t happen.”

“Kara…” Lena looks at you expectantly.

“I don’t… I don’t remember,” you laugh slightly and shake your head, as if this is another thing you can put down to your frazzled and often scattered disposition. “You know how forgetful I can be sometimes,” you reassure.

“Kara Danvers, you look at Daddy right now and tell me the truth.” Lena cups your cheeks harder, fiercely protective and worried. “I know you. I know when you are lying. I’m going to ask you one more time, did you say yellow?” You feel the nervous tremors in her elbows radiate up her forearms and into your cheeks.

You can’t lie, and that is by far the worst part.

You can’t hide away from it anymore.

You can’t brush it under the carpet.

You can’t put it down to being caught up in the moment, unable to verbalise your wants and limits.

You made it clear that you didn’t want those things to happen to you.

“I said yellow. I said it again and again when her hand was getting too tight on my throat and I didn't want her to hit me with the paddle anymore. I... I said red too." You nearly lose your breath with the memory of it. "I said it more than once but I thought she might not be able to hear me and when I tried to say it louder... I... I couldn't... I couldn’t say my safeword because her hand was too tight around my throat and all I could do was gulp for air. I zoned out after that. I could have said it again after she stopped paddling me. I could have put my clothes on but I just… I don’t know why I didn’t… I just went along with it all.” You utterly fall apart and start to tremble.

The next thing you’re aware of is two solid warm hands drawing you close until you’re against her chest, until her trembling forearms are safe and wrapped around you and her nose is burrowing into the top of your scalp and her scarlet lipstick is smearing the corner of your forehead. You shake and tremble, you cry and find yourself stuck right there in the moments you tried to make it stop.

“You’re such a good girl, such a good, good girl, none of this was your fault, not a single fucking second of it, you did nothing wrong baby,” Lena whispers and hushes, holding you tighter in her arms. “You didn’t deserve any of that. You didn’t ask for any of that. You didn’t make her do those things to you,” she repeats it again and again like a broken record.

“I could have said safeworded after she stopped. I could have put my clothes on and left before I did." You beat yourself up.

“You couldn't have done that because you were being assaulted, Kara,” Lena whispers against your head and you feel a hot wet splat hit your scalp.

Her hand comes up and wipes her cheek, and all you can do is try not to pay attention to the fact you’ve made her cry. It devours your insides. It throttles you. It makes you all too aware of the seriousness of this, and, in some small way, it makes you embarrassed that you tried to play it down in the first place.

Lena continued, her voice wobbling. “You tried to verbalise that you wanted to stop and you weren’t listened to. You went into shock and that is **not the same** as subspace. You went into survival mode. She created a dangerous situation and put you in the middle of it without a care for your safety or consent, and as soon as you knew you could get away safely you did. Whatever you want to do about what happened I will support you one-hundred percent. You have a choice, Kara, and it isn’t a decision you have to make tonight, but what happened wasn’t okay.”

The words skim over you. You’re not ready to let them settle in. You’re not prepared to bear the weight of what all of this means, or, think about how it’s going to affect you moving forward. It’s a lot. It’s too much. But you push forward into the human comforter sat in front of you and know that you have one safe thing to hide in. Lena won’t hurt you, she won’t make you say or do things you’re not ready to do, assured you are.

“You’re here, you’re home with me and that woman is never going to hurt you again.” Lena squeezes your wrists softly, her fingers slip inside of yours and you wonder how you could have longed for such a simple act without ever realising. “I’m a good girl and I haven’t done anything wrong, can you say it for me?”

“I’m a good girl and I didn’t—” You pause. Her light green eyes find you and her face nods reassuringly. “I didn’t do anything wrong,” you say tightly.

“Again,” Daddy requests.

“I’m a good girl and I didn’t do anything wrong,” you repeat quietly.

“You’re a good girl and you didn’t do anything wrong,” Lena parrots, pressing a kiss against your cheek.

She leans back into the pillows and pulls you with her, opening her arms and then closing them again around you, devouring you, smothering you in the best way possible, petting your head, stroking your cheek. You inhale a deep breath. You can taste the lightness of her perfume, it catches in the back of your throat and fills you with the strangest sense of security. You relax and allow yourself to be held like this.

“What happens after this?” You ask quietly, your words hot against her throat.

“Whatever you want to happen.” She doesn’t miss a beat. “You can trust me to support you but I’m not asking for that, let yourself be distrusting and unsure and vulnerable, let yourself process however you need to process everything. Just know I’m right here and I’ve got you, Kara. I will always be here.”

Maybe she always had you. Maybe she’s had you since the very first time you saw that twinkling smile and wrinkle of her nose when she laughs. You allow yourself to find the thought of her scary, you allow yourself to feel the fear of her letting you down terrifying, but it’s not enough to stop you nuzzling into the warmth of her and toying with the idea in your head of how right it feels to have her arms slung around you protectively.

“Can I stay here with you tonight, please?” You ask again, dumbly. “I want you to be my safe thing.”

“I wouldn’t want it any other way.” Lena’s lips quirk again.

She presses a soft kiss to your head, it’s innocent and gentle. It makes you feel like things will be okay. You inhale and settle into the nook of her armpit and allow yourself the comfort of silence.

Things will be alright. You will survive this too. Something tells you it won’t be easy, that there will be road bumps and entire sections of the map missing. It’s a terrifying thought, but, you know Lena won’t let you down, she’ll be right there helping you navigate what it means to now shoulder this burden, helping you pick up the pieces and make yourself alright.

Lena will be your safe thing, assured you are.

 

[You can find more stories like this right HERE along with my updates ahead of the curve.](http://theevangelion.tumblr.com)


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